…I was finally able to get out on a hike this weekend. Decided to give another local hike a try and it was intense. The overall mileage was low but the intensity was full force. You know when you first thought is “what have I gotten myself into”, it is going to be an intensive hike, and this one kept the pressure on the whole way up. I will be back to this trail on occassion. While I apprecate the intensity it is heavily populated which can be challenging on relatively narrow trails. However, the cardio benefits and the visual sites of San Gabriel make it all worth it in the end.

Quoted from Dan’s Hiking pages – Simpsoncity. com, “Garcia Trail is steep, climbing some 866 vertical feet per mile. But thetrail is well traveled and makes a nice workout hike (popular with students and staff from nearby Azusa Pacific University). A typical trail in the San Gabriels gains 400 to 600 vertical feet per mile, so Garcia Trail not only gives the legs and lungs a workout, but it also provides a reference mark in evaluating other trails.”

Today was a great day! It has been a short while, but long enough, since I was able to get out and do some hiking, Headed out to Mt. Wilson (http://www.simpsoncity.com/hiking/orchard.html) in Sierra Madre, near Pasadena. This is my all time favorite hiking location. It is well maintained, fellow hikers are friendly and it is not, I repeat NOT, overrun with “wannabe” hikers trying to jump on the band wagon. This is a serious and very beautiful hike. A few years back a fire ravaged a lot of the first portion of the trail though time heals and the trail is getting back to its glory. I took a few photos from the first marker, called First Water. Hiking is my favorite form of cardio. The trail has various levels you can reach from 1.5 miles to 7 miles all the way to the top (14 miles round trip) and yeah, I have been there. If you live locally and have not been to this trail you must go. The trailhead starts off Mira Monte Ave., many people have confused this side with the one that leads to the Sturtevant Falls (http://www.everytrail.com/guide/sturtevant-falls) which is completely different. I plan to make this year one filled with lots of hiking, if you have the good fortune to live near worthwhile trails, use them! Hiking is addicting and a great way to break a fitness rut.

Getting caught in that fad of reaching a specific weight is a sure way to give-up and fail at your goals. We are a nation of varied cultures, shapes and sizes, to say the very least. The scientific rule we have all heard based on the height to frame ratio is nonsense. Set a goal to be healthy, eat right and always implement some physical activity into your day. This will get you farther than using a weight scale as your only tool for gauging your fitness accomplishments. Look for new muscle tone, keep track of your measurements and pay attention to the looseness in your clothes. A scale can be discouraging and if you tend to weight yourself everyday! even worse. Weight fluctuates with the slightest of change. If you had something with too much sodium the night before, you could easily experience a hefty dose of water retention, which can dramatically change the number you saw on the scale the day before. Don’t get me wrong, spot checking yourself now and again is good way to make sure you haven’t completely fallen off the boat, so-to-speak. However, if you are solely dedicated to the scale, keep in mind “it is just a number”!

To many people talk-the-talk, and never walk-the walk: “I can drop weight” “I can get fit” ” I can do that…” ” I know how to eat right”. Talk is cheap…DON’T TALK ABOUT IT; BE ABOUT IT! Let your results speak for themselves…

Unfortunately, most people striving to lose those extra pounds, and looking for fitness and health, fail to realize that the “road never ends”. Fad diets, starvation, appetite suppressants – these are all part of the arsenal of bad ways to lose weight and keep it off. I hear my own extended family members all too often comment on how little they ate in a day, or about how they starved themselves yesterday and already lost three (3) pounds. “Can’t you tell”, they remark, just two days after they started this taboo ritual. Needless to say, not one of them has ever maintained any type of long term weight loss. What a lot of people fail to realize is that it’s all temporary unless you stay committed to a life change. Alter your ways, alter your foods, institute a workout regime and make it a habit. Even then; most people I know will stop everything once they get within 20lbs of an actual goal and end up gaining more weight than when they started. It takes work, it takes commitment and it takes you realizing what you want out of life. Vanity weight comes and goes; true health and fitness is a road that never ends…

…even little piggies are getting fit! With 2013 approaching often times it’s the new year “resolution” that gets people motivated (at least for a few weeks, maybe even months). Whatever the reason find time to make 2013 your life changer…best of luck in health and fitness for 2013 and beyond.